The progress towards wealth in this new state of things was very slow, but the equality that prevailed amongst feudal barons, their love of war and glory, and the leisure they enjoyed, by degrees extended the limits of commerce very widely, as the northern world never could produce many articles which its inhabitants had by their connection with the south learnt to relish and enjoy. The intermediate countries, that naturally formed a link of connection between the ancient nations of the east and the rough inhabitants of the north, profited the most by this circumstance; and we still find the borders of the Mediterranean Sea, though no longer the seat of power, the places where wealth was chiefly concentrated. The impossibility of the inhabitants of the northern countries transporting their rude and heavy produce, in order to exchange it for the luxuries of the south, gave rise to manufactures as well as fishing on the southern confines of the Baltic Sea; from whence arose the wealth of Flanders, Holland, and the Hans Towns. This forms an epoch entirely new in its nature and description, and its termination was only brought on by the great discovery of the passage to Asia, by the Cape of Good Hope, and to America, by sailing straight out into the Atlantic Ocean. The nations that had till those discoveries been the best situated for [end of page #3] commerce no longer enjoyed that advantage; by that means it changed its abode; but not only did it change its abode, it changed its nature, and the trifling commerce that had hitherto been carried on by the intervention of caravans by land, or of little barks coasting on the borders of the Mediterranean Sea, (never venturing, without imminent danger, to lose sight of the shore,) {7} was dropt for that bold and adventurous navigation, connecting the most distant parts of the world; between which since then large vessels pass with greater expedition and safety than they formerly did between the Grecian Islands, or from Italy to Africa. Three inventions, two in commerce and the other in war, nearly of equal antiquity, formed this into one of these epochs that gives a new feature to things.